Tennessee changes policy on teacher licenses

The Tennessee State Board of Education cut ties Monday with a highly controversial policy that would have allowed poor student growth on tests to be a reason to pull teachers' professional licenses.

In its place, commissioners advanced an alternative plan on first reading that would instead provide easier paths for Tennessee's highest graded teachers.

That proposal, set for a final vote in July after clearing the state board unanimously Monday, would let teachers who earn a high score of "5" on annual state-mandated teacher evaluations over consecutive years earn up to 20 of the required 60 professional development credits needed to renew professional licenses.

Fifteen development credits would be on the table for teachers who earn a "4," and 10 credits for those who net a "3." Teachers could also get credit for attending professional development seminars, taking college-level coursework and earning National Board Certification.

Though billed by state education officials as a move to streamline the licensure process for high-performing teachers, Tennessee Education Commissioner Kevin Huffman suggested that while it satisfies a new state law, the plan does little to ensure quality instructors. He said he doesn't want people to be "confused" that the revamped proposal guarantees all teachers who are renewing their license are performing at high levels.

"If you're performing in the classroom, that's great — you shouldn't have to do some of the paperwork that you otherwise would have to do," he said.

"But just being pretty blunt about this: This isn't a statement of quality of anything in terms of renewing a license. It's just sort of where we wound up throughout the whole process."

Directed by the state legislature, the board took a final step Monday to withdraw from a policy enacted last August that would have allowed the non-renewal of licenses of teachers who scored poorly on annual evaluations.

Huffman had pushed the change last year to establish a new minimum bar for teachers to advance professionally, noting only 100 to 200 licenses wouldn't be renewed each year because of chronically poor teacher evaluation scores. It was met with widespread criticism among lawmakers of both parties, however, who argued stripping teachers of their ability to work went too far.

A bill that cleared the legislature, which Gov. Bill Haslam signed into law in April, specifically prevented non-renewal from being based on teachers' value-added data.

Other parts of the revamped teacher policy plan, which would go into effect in September 2015, are much the same as the rescinded policy from August, Those include consolidating multiple license types into practitioner and professional licenses for the majority of teachers, and reducing the validity period of professional licenses from 10 years to six.

The first professional license teachers receive, the practitioner's license, would retain the current three-year validity period.

Although evaluations will no longer be tied punitively to teacher licensing, Huffman said parents in communities with chronically poorly graded teachers "have the right to know." The state has other ways of intervening, such as mandating additional in-class observations for teachers who habitually score "1" or "2" on evaluations. Local districts are relied on to come up with improvement plans, however.

Sara Heyburn, assistant commissioner of education, said the department is weighing a new star system that would recognize which teachers are consistently performing well on evaluations. Whether that would be part of a licensure policy isn't clear.

"We need to do everything we can to recognize our outstanding teachers," board chairman Fielding Rolston agreed. "They're out there. The challenge is to figure out exactly how to do it. We need to do more than we're doing."